Welcome to The Way of the Higher Self, a spiritual path of self-transformation. Wherever you are on your journey, I honor the work you've done to get there, and appreciate your willingness to consider what is offered here.
From that place of respect and appreciation, I offer these questions:
-
Would you like to be more grounded, more loving and more effective in pursuing your goals?
-
Would you like to be freely and fully yourself, justifiably trusting that your words and actions will always be constructive?
-
Would you welcome a relaxed and yet passionate life, with real and rewarding relationships, uninhibited creativity, and commitment to a spiritual life task?
Whatever pain and confusion life may have brought you, these things are achievable. All you need are a willingness to work for them, and truly reliable tools, such as the Seven Practices of The Way of the Higher Self:
-
Feel All of Our Feelings
-
Observe Ourselves with Maximum Honesty and Compassion
-
Own Our Judgments and Reactions as Reflections of Our Selves
-
Understand Our Life Circumstances as Spiritual "Effects"
-
Develop an Intention to Give Our Best to Life
-
Visualize Higher-Self Influence
-
Connect with Higher Energies and Consciousness
The practices, and their conceptual foundations, are briefly explained on this website, for those who appreciate receiving information in writing. More complete explanations are provided in the videos, and matching podcast episodes. Other than some totally optional information about me, everything on the website is covered in the videos and podcasts.
For more introductory material about The Way of the Higher Self, click here.
Most of us come to spiritual seeking, and the related task of working on ourselves, from a longing to live fuller, and happier lives. It’s also true, though, that in walking this path, we serve humanity as a whole. Just as we need to evolve in order to thrive individually, we need evolved individuals among us in order to survive collectively.
Whether or not this material meets you where you are, blessings on your path.
– Karl Oakes
The Longing To Live Fully:
"Every human being senses an inner longing
that goes deeper than the longings for emotional and creative fulfillment. Perhaps the most accurate 'translation'
of this longing would be a feeling or sensing that another, more fulfilling state of consciousness, and a larger
capacity to experience life, must exist."
~ Pathwork Lecture 204, "What Is The Path?” ~
What Is The Higher Self?
The easiest way to define the higher self is by the qualities it expresses, such as love, creativity, compassion, respect, honesty, fairness, and discernment. Every human being has a higher self, and every human being is at least somewhat disconnected from it by misconceptions, negative attitudes, resentments, energy blockages, and so on. These interfering energies produce behaviors characteristic of what we can call the lower self, such as hate, destructiveness, aggression, submission, indifference, laziness, self-importance, and manipulation.
To varying degrees, each of us is afflicted by a lower self, and each of us tends to deny its existence, choosing to adopt a more favorable view of who we are (an “idealized self-image”), and to “sell” that image to ourselves as well as to others. To the extent that we do this, we cut ourselves off from true happiness.
Not only does living organically from the higher self generate more positive responses from the outside world, but it is pleasurable in and of itself. The Way of the Higher Self offers us practices which help dissolve the obstructions which separate us from this positive experience of life.
The most basic premise of The Way of the Higher Self is that in order to infuse our entire being with the energy of the higher self, we have to confront, explore, understand, forgive, and educate the lower self, giving up our attachment to the idealized self-image (and thus our vanity) along the way. While there are seven practices which make up The Way of the Higher Self, “observe ourselves with honesty and compassion,” which embodies this basic premise, is the one without which none of the others will really work. How suitable this path is for you depends a lot on how drawn you are to living in self-honesty and with self-compassion.
The Organic Experience of Life:
"That which you have so far experienced
only on isolated occasions, the manifestation of
your intuitive nature, will become more and more
a constant reaction. You will have the deep inner knowledge
— not in your brain but in your solar plexus —
that your reaction, or your knowledge, or your decision is right,
feeling neither guilt nor pride nor doubt.
You will spontaneously be the best you can be:
poised and unrepressed.
"You will say the right thing
at the right time and know when not to speak.
You will be relaxed and concentrated at the same time,
fully aware and alive to the moment and its requirements.
You will know that nothing that should be yours
could fail to come to you."
~ Pathwork Lecture 77,
"Self-Confidence: Its True Origin and What Prohibits It" ~
